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BAGHDAD — Car-bomb blasts and other explosions tore through mainly Shiite districts across
Baghdad during morning rush hour yesterday in a day of violence that killed at least 80.

It was the latest set of large-scale sectarian attacks to hit Iraq, even as the government went
on “high alert” in case a possible Western strike in neighboring Syria increases Iraq’s
turmoil.

A relentless wave of killing has left thousands dead since April. The surge in violence raises
fears that Iraq is hurtling back toward the widespread sectarian killing that peaked in 2006 and
2007, when the country was teetering on the edge of civil war.

Most of yesterday’s attacks happened within minutes of each other as people headed to work or
were out shopping early in the day. Insurgents unleashed explosives-laden cars, suicide bombers and
other bombs that targeted parking lots, outdoor markets and restaurants in predominantly Shiite
areas in and around Baghdad, officials said. A military convoy was hit south of the capital.

“What sin have those innocent people committed?” asked Ahmed Jassim, who witnessed one of the
explosions in Baghdad’s Hurriyah neighborhood. “We hold the government responsible.”

The northern neighborhood of Kazimiyah, home to a prominent Shiite shrine, was among the worst
hit. Two bombs went off in a parking lot, followed by a suicide car bomber who struck onlookers who
had gathered at the scene. Police said the attack killed 10 people and wounded 27.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attacks, but they bore the hallmarks of
the Iraqi branch of al-Qaida, which operates in Iraq under the name the Islamic State of Iraq and
the Levant. The group frequently targets Shiites, which it considers heretics, and carries out
coordinated bombings in an attempt to incite sectarian strife.

In one particularly brutal attack, a Shiite family was shot dead at home in the largely Sunni
town of Latifiyah, about 20 miles south of Baghdad. Four children, ages 8 to 16, were killed along
with their parents and an uncle, police said.

Many of the day’s blasts targeted shoppers. One bomb in a parked car in a commercial area in
Baghdad’s northern Shaab neighborhood killed nine. Another blast from a parked car killed 19 in
outdoor markets in the sprawling slum of Sadr City, the northeastern neighborhood of Shula, the
southeastern Jisr Diyala district and the eastern New Baghdad area.

Outside the capital, a suicide bomber blew himself up near a restaurant in Mahmoudiyah, about 20
miles south of Baghdad, killing five. And in Madain, about15 miles southeast of Baghdad, a roadside
bomb struck a passing military patrol, killing four soldiers.

While Shiite areas bore the brunt of the attacks, Sunni areas were targeted late in the day.

A bomb in a parked car exploded late yesterday as worshippers left a mosque in Baghdad’s western
Yarmouk neighborhood, killing four. Several Sunni mosques have been attacked in recent months,
raising the possibility that largely inactive Shiite militias are starting to carry out retaliatory
attacks.

Later, police said a bomb in a parked car hit a coffee shop in the largely Sunni neighborhood of
Azamiyah, killing six.

Medical officials confirmed the casualty figures, which included more than 250 wounded.

The violence follows months of protests by Iraq’s Sunni minority against the Shiite-led
government.

More than 510 people have been killed so far in August, according to an Associated Press
count.